Jon Amos

By BBC News Staff, BBC Online Network (September 15, 1999).

British disabled athlete Jon Amos has cycled into the record books after powering across Australia on a hand cycle. The astonishing feat follows Mr. Amos' trek up Mount Kilimanjaro last year when he claimed a wheelchair mountaineering record.

For his latest endurance test, Mr. Amos, a paraplegic from Bristol, rode from Darwin in north Australia to Adelaide in the south on a cycle designed with hand pedals. Using his arms for propulsion, he covered 100 miles a day reaching top speeds of 25 miles per hour. He completed the journey in just over five weeks.

Official record

Camel trekkers and solar bike cyclists have crossed Australia, but this was the first attempt in the new sport of handcycling. En route he asked local mayors to verify his progress in order to set an official record. Mr Amos and his Royal Marine support team also tried out rival designs of hand cycle. A Canadian one [the VARNA Handcycle] resembling a light weight racing bike is the most established make. But they also tested a new prototype from British Aerospace which has more gears and faster gear changes.

Mr. Amos said the gruelling ride, battling against head winds and hills, had proved his greatest challenge so far. ''This has superseded all that I've done before. I'm finding out new things about myself - how my body and my mental state coped with this,'' he added. ''[The trip] was to create awareness from an able bodied point of view of what people with disabilities can achieve.

''But it was also to show disabled people what they can achieve if they want to.''